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Rename June 12 As M.K.O Abiola Day – CACOL

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“This inform why we advise that the Government should declare the day (June 12) MKO Abiola Day, never to be forgotten and reiterate the lesson and occasion when we all chorus and say, NEVER AGAIN.

The Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership (CACOL) has asked the Nigerian government to rename June 12 as the MKO Abiola Day in the national calendar.
Debo Adeniran, Executive Chairman, CACOL, said this while commemorating the inaugural celebration of the June 12 as the country’s Democracy Day.
Commending President Muhammadu Buhari for honouring MKO Abiola by naming the National Stadium, Abuja, after him, Adeniran asked the President to order the electoral commission body to officially release the result of the June 1993 Presidential election.
“This inform why we advise that the Government should declare the day (June 12) MKO Abiola Day, never to be forgotten and reiterate the lesson and occasion when we all chorus and say, NEVER AGAIN.
“It is gratifying that the NATIONAL STADIUM Abuja has been named after this patriotic Nigerian who laid down his life for the emergence of a new Nigeria with so much éclat, we implore the government to compel Prof Humphrey Nwosu the then National Electoral Commission of Nigeria, NECON, to officially declare the final results of the June 12, 1993 Presidential elections, which Prof Nwosu have confirm Chief MKO Abiola won fair and square, so that he would be officially recognized as the 2nd democratically elected President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (FRN) and accorded all benefits and recognition derivable therefrom.”
Adeniran condemned politicians in Nigeria for misusing the democracy Abiola fought for adding that the struggle has been betrayed.
He said, “Today, this same day, ironically, has been used by certain elements that were either originally responsible for the unfortunate annulment and destruction of a rare chance of rooting democracy in the country or those people that later ethicized or betrayed the struggle, one way or the other.
“One of the key figures in that epoch was Alhaji Bababgana Kingibe, a Vice Presidential candidate of Chief Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola, believed to have abandoned the ship when it mattered most and currently a member of the kitchen cabinet to President Muhammadu Buhari’s federal government.
This is why the JUNE 12 has become different things to the classes of the ruled and the rulers.
“To those in government, it represents a day their class survived a major political tsunami, meant to galvanize and mobilize the mass against their rudderless system and supplants their reign, while majority Nigerians view it as a day the masses had an opportunity to free themselves from the shackles of social enslavement and economic miasma.”

THE PEOPLE’S THRUST

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THE PEOPLE’S THRUST by Debo Adeniran

EKITI 2018: OUR VOTE, OUR FUTURE

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Keynote address by Comrade Debo Adeniran, Executive Chairman of Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership, CACOL at the Summit on Civic Education #EkitiVote2018 organised by Ekiti Project Vote 2018 at Christ School Alumni Hall, Ado-Ekiti, Ekiti State, Nigeria on 22 February, 2018

 

Protocol

 

I must express my delight and appreciation for the honour and privilege of being Chairman/Keynote Speaker at this all important and very auspicious Summit on Civic Education organized by #EkitiVote2018. I am truly humbled and doubly honoured as I have also been nominated for the esteemed ‘The 2018-2019 Ekiti Project Vote Role Model /Ambassador Award’, just as I thank the organisers for deeming me worthy of this honour.

 

The significance of today’s event at such a crucial and decisive period when our country, Nigeria is preparing for yet another set of elections coming up between 2018 and 2019 cannot be overemphasized considering that the coming electoral processes present another opportunity for Nigerians to decide those that would govern them in the nearest future through the ballot.

 

Our Vote, Our future

 

The theme of the Summit “Ekiti 2018: Our Vote Our Future” is very apt based on the nexus it highlights; that is the connectivity between voting in the present and the socio-political and economic consequences on the society in future. As they say the people deserve the kind of leadership get because they through their votes establish a social contract between them and those that govern.

 

The importance of voting as a civic responsibility is paramount to the success of democracy as it is the only legitimate way to participate in deciding how governments emerge and the means through which the people can take control of their socio-economic destiny indirectly through their elected representatives. By engaging in civic responsibility, citizens ensure and uphold certain democratic values enshrined in the founding document, that is, the constitution of the country.

 

The voting process empowers and grants the people the right to voice their opinion, and agree with or disapprove of the actions taken by the stewards of public trust, who we help put into office to represent us. Many people do not exercise this right yet they will bash, ridicule, make declarations about and slander the people elected into office and the government itself and ultimately condemn themselves to a fate of ‘suffering and smiling’.

 

It is instructive to highlight that with the experience of recent elections, particularly the 2015 general elections, the chaos that hitherto characterized our electoral system have been greatly diminished whereby the votes of the people are evidently counting as the country’s democratization process deepens.

 

If as a people we are worried about the trajectory and direction of our country, if we are concerned about our fate as a people; then we must bring down the walls of apathy by shunning petty sulking and complaining, we should instead take action by performing our civic responsibilities.

 

We must accept that the present in terms of governance performance is as a result of the choices we made in the past elections in same the way our future socio-economically will be determined by our voting patterns in the oncoming elections.

 

It is based on the foregoing that civil populace must be enlightened on the consequences of their actions or inactions as far as carrying out their civic responsibility of voting is concerned particularly.

 

It therefore behove on the civil society organizations, community based organizations, political parties and relevant government agencies especially the National Orientation Agency, NOA and the Independent National Election Commission, INEC to make concerted efforts in the civic education of the people. Efforts such as this summit and other strategic tools must be deployed in reaching the minds of the people achieve a populace that is at all times conscious of their civic responsibilities.

 

Since the return to democracy in 1999, less than 40% of registered voters [28 million out of 58 million in 2015]; meaning less than 20% of our total population have been deciding our fate as a nation through their votes in elections! With less than 20% of the population that have been voting; the reality is that the winners of the [presidential] elections have been elected by less than 10% of the population [in 2015, the winner of the election had less than 15 million votes out of a population of more than 160 million in total]. With our population being very youthful, the number of registered voters in Nigeria should be within the range of 90 million to 100 million people!

 

The implication of all these is that only a minority of our population has been participating in elections, even worse, is that our leaders have been elected by an even a smaller minority of our population.

 

We must wake our people from their sleepless slumbers; we must facilitate a qualitative and quantitative collective consciousness that would enhance the participation of the silent majority.  It is such a consciousness that can galvanize people to getting registered on the voters register; getting their PVCs; participating in the campaigns by interrogating the candidates and parties with the coming elections.

 

 

 

Conclusion

 

Quintessentially, it is significant to point out that routine election as a democratic practice does not necessarily translate to collective control of the socio-economic existence of the people. Even though our constitution provides for government to ensure the socio-economic rights of the people whereby their security and social wellbeing is prioritized in a way that the wealth of the people is not concentrated in a few hands as required of a democracy, the aberration of this reality is what obtains.

 

Consequently, as the 2018 – 2019 elections approach and with the excruciating conditions of living of the majority, Nigerians must rise in unison to struggle for the assertion of their socio-economic rights as dialectically required components of a democracy under best practices. Chapter 2 of the Nigerian constitution should be the guide in the choices we make in the elections by ensuring that the governments at all levels commit to the security and social welfare of the populace before earning their votes.

 

The economic practice of neo-liberalism that has continued to be imposed on country by successive governments is antithetical to democracy given that it has only succeeded in widening the gap between the rich and the poor. The Bretton Woods institution dictated neo-liberal policies which have failed almost in every country it had been imbibed must be abandoned to achieve a socio-economically harmonious existence of the people.

 

Beyond elections, Nigerians must invigorate the struggles for social emancipation holistically because the present status quo will perpetually ensure penury in their lives if the system is not overhauled and replaced with a more humane one that would guarantee the social welfare and security of life and property. Today, if Beko was to be alive, he shall definitely lead the campaign for socio-economic rights, not campaign for one thieving party or the other through the rituals of four yearly balloting:

 

SOCIO-ECONOMIC RIGHTS ARE NON-NEGOTIABLE: LET’S DEMAND FOR ITS ENFORCEABILITY IN THE COURTS OF LAW AS NIGERIANS:

 

  • The right of all Nigerians to work and to be well remunerated must be recognized
  • Right of all to be well Sheltered – Housing for all
  • Right to Education at all levels at the expense of the State
  • Right to receive medical treatment at the expense of the State
  • Social Welfare Schemes for Nigerians, for the aged and physically and mentally challenged
  • Unemployment Benefit Package for all adults that not productively engaged.
  • Fair wages for fair labour
  • Management of the commanding heights of the national economy for the benefits of the entire nation and never concentrated in the hands of a cabal.
  • Bridge the gaps between the wretched and the super-rich, economic inequalities and social injustice.

 

“Each generation must, out of relative obscurity, discover its mission, fulfill it, or betray it.” — Frantz Fanon

 

The electorates of Ekiti must shun amala and ‘stomach infrastructure’ politics now, and that is the generation role history has imposed on us. Once again, I thank the organizers for this delightful opportunity, I am humbled.

Thank you all for your attention. Long Live Ekiti! Long Live Nigeria!!

 

 

 

Debo Adeniran

Executive Chairman, CACOL

08037194969

dadnig@yahoo.com

www.deboadeniran.com

 

 

 

House Directs Julius Berger to Pay N422m Debt to MFB

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Nkem-Uzoma-Abonta

The House of Representatives has adopted the report of its Committee on Public Petition, chaired led by Hon. Nkem Uzoma Abonta, directing construction giant, Julius Berger Plc to obey a court order which mandated it to pay the sum of N422.4 million debt to Toki Rainbow Microfinance Bank.

Already, the Clerk of the National Assembly, Mr. Mohammed Sani-Omolori, has communicated the lawmakers’ position to the management of the construction company.

The Chairman, Toki Rainbow MFB, Mr. Richard Samuel, had in a petition to the House, dated March 3, 2017, claimed that the bank had advanced the loan facility to the construction firm in March 1997 for the purpose of working capital financing.
He said contrary to the terms of the loan agreement, Julius Berger refused to offset its obligation to the financial institution.

He said: “Consequently, the matter was taken before the High Court in Rivers State where a judgment was delivered in our favour on the 2nd of December, 2003 asking Julius Berger to settle their debt to us.

“They appealed the judgment at the Court of Appeal where judgment was delivered in our favour on June 30, 2007.”
Meanwhile, the Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership (CACOL) has petitioned the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Yakubu Dogara over an alleged corruption and abuse of office by the Director General, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Mr. Mounir Gwarzo.

He is accused for among other things, of ordering the payment of N104.85 million severance package for himself after he was elevated to the position of Director General of the commission on May 2015 from Executive Commissioner.

Executive Chairman of CACOL, Mr. Debo Adeniran, said Gwarzo’s action was in total disregard of standing rule in the civil service which stipulates that severance benefit can only be paid to an employee who has concluded his or her service and has completely disengaged from service and not to an employee who has been promoted within the commission as in the case of the incumbent DG.

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CACOL TASKS NEW ANTI CORRUPTION COMMITTEE -DEMANDS SANITY IN GOVERNANCE

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Today, the National Judicial Council, NJC, led by Justice Walter Nkanu Onnoghen, began another landmark journey in an effort to rid Nigeria of the dangerous cankerworm that has been the bane of our national development with the inauguration of Corruption and Financial Crime Cases Trial Monitoring Committee. It is common knowledge that a committee of this nature is necessary in a clime where corruption has become the major albatross stunting our national development. And now that it is becoming almost obvious that perpetrators of the heinous crime have formed a cartel pillaging the progress of moves to fight the scourge of corruption, it will not be out of place for any determined government on the track of combating corruption to raise a monitoring committee, such as this, to ensure the success of the fight.

 

While we commend the effort of government and the leadership of the NJC for the laudable move, the Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership, CACOL, hereby admonishes the members of the new committee to by themselves undergo self-appraisal, task their consciences and honourably throw in the towel should they see any impediment that could impede the successful delivery of the task before them. We make bold to say this as we know it would be difficult for any lawyer or judge that is involved in any high profile corruption case, to deliver without bias in a committee as respectable and highly important as the Corruption and Financial Crime Cases Trial Monitoring Committee.

For a lawyer who is holding brief in a high profile corruption case or a judge sitting in judgement over such cases to be in a committee as sensible as this, is in itself counterproductive and should be condemned and discouraged. We are of the opinion that the regime of serving the nation for the benefits attached to the office should stop while a new dawn of selfless service for the general upliftment and glory of our nation and humanity should take over if we must wriggle out of our present Egypt to the Promised Land, where equity, fair play and justice reign.

 

It is on this note that CACOL advocates that seeing appointment such as this as a call for service entails that any judge that has direct dealing with a corruption case, should be honourable enough to bow out of the budding committee. We also view that any lawyer that is defence counsel to any allegedly corrupt public office holder need not be in the esteemed committee because such presence automatically takes away the credibility of the committee.

 

Nigeria is blessed with an array of intellectuals cutting across all segments of human endeavours. It will then be no excuse to complain of dearth of credible people with unblemished records and who can serve without bias in a committee as sensitive as this and which duty is of dire importance to our nation at this point.

It is also in this spirit that we call upon the Federal Government to be circumspect in its recent bid to enlarge its cabinet with the appointment of more ministers.

 

To us in CACOL, the problem with the nation is not with the number of the ministers we have but in ensuring that the right people are recruited to do the right job. It has been our position that the current cabinet, as constituted, comprises some round pegs in square holes, the reason for the lingering lull in the speed of development in so many sectors of our economy and the attendant heavy tolls on the masses of this country.

 

The idea of recruiting rookies to government as compensation for loyalty without recourse to fitness and mastery of the portfolio such person is saddled with, must stop. For the umpteenth time, we are calling for the dropping of the Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr Babatunde RajiFashola, the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mr Malami Abubakar, Minister of Finance and Economic Development, Mrs Kemi Adeosun, Minister of State, Petroleum Resources, Dr Ibe Kachikwu, among others .

 

These ministers have displayed gross incompetence in their various ministries as their impacts are scarcely felt by Nigerians. The earlier they are replaced with competent citizens taking over their portfolios, the better for all of us and the nation at large.

 

We also canvass that the President relieves himself of the position of the Minister of Petroleum. It is an anomaly in governance that must be speedily corrected.

 

Lastly, CACOL congratulates the new Chairman of the Corruption and Financial Crime Cases Trial Monitoring Committee, Justice SulaimanGaladima. Galadima replaced former President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Ayo Salami who was earlier nominated to lead the team butrejected the offer.

 

We wish the committee members good luck and success in the execution of the enormous job placed in their hands as Nigerians look forward to a society free of corruption and sundry iniquities.

 

 

LET THE CHARADE STOP – CACOL HAILS THE SACK OF LAWAL AND OKE, CAUTIONS SENATOR ISA MISAU

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The Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership, CACOL, is elated to learn that President Muhammadu Buhari has relieved the suspended Secretary to the government of the Federation Babachir Lawal as well as the suspended Director-General of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) Mr Ayodele Oke. We are delighted that the president has demonstrated that he does not tolerate any act of corruption and abuse of office no matter who is involved. The president has proven his detractors wrong by demonstrating that he is not given to frivolities and could not be intimidated by anyone no matter how influential, no matter how powerful or no matter how crafty.

We commend the Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo for a job well done on the onerous assignment of investigating the allegations against the top-notch government officials, who committed crimes against Nigerian people with unbridled gusto, which the President Mohammed Buhari entrusted on him and his team before the President went on medical vacation.

We hope that these disgraceful elements would be promptly handed over to relevant anti-graft agencies for prosecution with a view to ensuring that deterrent punishments are meted out to the to curb such inordinate ambition by government officials. We equally urge the judiciary to key into the renewed vigour that the fight against corruption has now assumed. Every law officer involved in the adjudication in corruption cases should ensure that justice is not only done, it should be seen by all and sundry to have been done.

We hereby reiterate our call that henceforth, any law enforcement agent, lawyer or judge that assists corruption criminal to evade justice should be treated as an accomplice. The charade in handling corruption cases must stop forthwith!

Meanwhile, CACOL is troubled by the lingering faceoff between Senator Isa Misau, a Senator representing Borno State in the Upper Chamber and the Inspector General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, over perceived unfounded allegations of official misconduct and corruption. We are alarmed by the shallowness of these claims and call for a quick intervention that can save our dear country from further image battering.

While CACOL upholds discipline and patriotism as hallmarks of public officers, we take serious exceptions to any act of reducing our hallowed chambers to avenues of settling personal scores and other trivialities. We are miffed by the utterances and outcries of Senator Misau, which we are bold to say, smacks of an attempt to settle personal scores with the IGP Idris.

While we uphold that the offences alleged to have been committed by the police boss are grievous, prima facie (from the face value), we are appalled that the distinguished senator has been acting as if there are no other serious jobs to do in the hallowed chambers, by submitting himself to be free advocate for seemingly phantom allegation of official debauchery on the part of IGP Idris. To accuse the highest ranking police officer in the country of adultery even when there are no established cases from victims is to us a vendetta taken too far.

We wonder why an alleged amorous affair of an IGP becomes the object of serious discourse for a legislative arm of government that has so much pressing bills before it, yet to be attended to. Since we have not heard any complaint from victims of these alleged sexual escapades, Senator Misau, can’t just pole vault to being their solicitor. We are of the opinion that it should be a private life of the Inspector General which should be so treated.
We also take exception to the claim of the IGP promoting certain officers allegedly unfoundedly.

To us, this claim is baseless as it is common practice in the police for promotions to follow the appointment of a new IGP. There are loyalists everywhere and it is just normal to appoint people you trust in some strategic areas if you must succeed and as well promote some if the need arise. Clinging unto allegations, such as this, is viewed by us, a personal vendetta and an attempt to settle personal score at Nigerians’ expense. It must be disregarded.

Further to the baselessness of Senator Misau’s claims, he accused the police boss of giving two vehicles to the wife of the President, Aisha Mohammadu Buhari. The Senator portrayed the allegation as if the vehicles were private luxury cars offered and accepted as bribes for a favour for either party that only Misau knows. It was later found out that the two vehicles, a Toyota Sienna and a Hiace bus bear police plate numbers, were assigned as official security vehicles for the wife of the president. As if these frivolous allegations were not ridiculous enough, this Senator Misau further accused the IGP of posting Mr Edgal Imohimi to Lagos state as Acting Commissioner of Police because Imohinmi was a classmate to Governor Akinwunmi Ambode. Is Senator Misau suggesting, without verifiable evidence, that the Governor or Mr Imohimi bribed the IGP to be so posted? Could the lawmaker be insinuating that it is not the prerogative of the IGP to post his officers the way he deems fit or that the police officer so posted is not qualified to hold such responsibility? What pettiness and a vendetta taken too far to a new height!

At CACOL, as much as we abhor favouratism, nepotism and lopsided distribution of available opportunities, we frown at the lingering show of shame and the ridicule this Senator is putting our dear country into in the comity of nations. It must stop.

We are aware that the Senate has set up an eight-member committee to investigate Idris while the police boss is also in court to challenge what he viewed as abuse to his rights.

Our position is clear. We call for an immediate disbandment of the Senate Committee, as the upper legislative chamber should face squarely more pressing governance issues, and a discontinuation of the lingering investigation on Mr Ibrahim Idris. It is abnormal and unnecessary.

CACOL condemns this act of display of personality clash and open show of hatred gravitating towards self-destruct between these valued citizens. We call for an amicable settlement of the unhidden quarrel between the two while not bothering the nation on issues that are visibly personal. The earlier this is done, the better for all of us and the nation at large.

Debo Adeniran
Executive Chairman, CACOL
08037194969,
dadnig@yahoo.com,
cacolc@yahoo.com,
www.deboadeniran.com,

For more press releases and statements, please visit our website at
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VIDEO: Fela was a phenomenon that can be compare with the gods -Debo Adeniran

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NIGERIA, 57 YEARS AFTER INDEPENDENCE: CALLS FOR RESTRUCTURING, PROSPECTS AND FORGING AHEAD IN NATION BUILDING – CACOL

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57 years after independence, the clamour for ‘restructuring’ continues to resonate and as the next general elections closes in, it may seem like the call is now getting to the climax. The agitations that have surrounded what is called the ‘National Question’, which ‘restructuring’ is a component of, have gotten to crescendos and tipping edges that are akin to what we are witnessing presently in the country. The character of the political class and elites that have dominated the Nigerian socio-political and economic space, both in and out of power have no doubts constituted a huge obstacle to nation building which have led to several repeated starts, fake or transient victories.
 
The fact is that the discerning Nigerians who understand the history of the political intrigues of the country in the past years would apparently adduce the coming general elections in 2019; and the mostly inordinate ambitions of desperate and opportunistic politicians as the reason behind the recent calls for restructuring.  
 
At the Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership, CACOL, when the renewed call began to gain ascendancy recently in agitations, we had said that the restructuring of Nigeria’s body polity required to be profoundly interrogated, to understand the motivations and core purpose of the seemingly justified call.
 
Circumspection on all the labyrinths of issues over the National question remain very imperative, so as not to fall into the pitfalls of the past.  Nigeria with the apparent faulty foundations remain shaky owing to the historical reality that Nigeria and Africa in general were indeed partitioned at the bayoneting ends of the guns of colonizers; for the convenience of their political cum economic exploitation and subjugation of the people.
 
Again without any iota of doubt, the call to restructure Nigeria is neither the exclusive preserve of the ruling class in their intra-class fractional and factional struggles, nor is it a new call. It is a call, a demand, a bargaining weapon of choice, in their now covert, now overt intra-class skirmishes as 2019 general elections approaches.
 
The truth is that no matter how Nigeria is ‘restructured’, the fundamental issue will remain about the social emancipation of the vast majority of the people. Any form of restructuring that is not achieved side by side with the social emancipation of the component units of Nigeria will amount to naught. Such achievement will make no significant difference in National life and the lives of majority of the people who would still remain oppressed and exploited in any arrangement that emerges from ‘restructuring’ designed and controlled by the present ruling class i.e. the representatives of the political and economic status quo.
 
We are convinced that unless and until when the oppressed people of the different component units of Nigeria unite against their oppressors in their various units in a popular process that will put the destinies of the vast majority in their hands regardless of the unit/s they come from, the National question may permanently become a permanent question.
 
The pre-independence constitutional conferences, as well as the post-independence constitutional reform processes have all been at the heart, about restructuring Nigeria, as has been the numerous state agitation/state creation processes and the many constitutional and political conferences.
 
It is important to learn from the history of Nigeria’s several attempts at addressing the National question, either initiated by the Government or by the people (Civil society). From the Obasanjo staged managed National Conference to the last National Confab organized by the Jonathan Goodluck-led government, it is explicit that the call for restructuring and addressing the National question is beyond what the status quo will organize for obvious reasons.
 
The call to restructure Nigeria, it must be affirmed has also periodically found resonance among ordinary Nigerian citizens like National Consultative Forum, NCF and Pro-Peoples’ National Conference, PRONACO which gained traction particularly in times of deepening economic and political crisis. The more debilitating the economic crisis, the greater the instability in the polity, the louder the calls for restructuring gets.
 
Therefore the ongoing groupings and meetings across the country on restructuring are also not new. But the quintessential questions would be: do they have the full mandate and representative capacities to speak on behalf of the group, sectional or regional interests they lay claim to represent? What do their constituents understand by restructuring; the gains, losses and are they on the same page in terms of consensus? What would restructuring translate into practically; for the vast majority that will bear the brunt of possible gains or losses in terms of social economic development? What are the modalities for restructuring if a consensus is reached that such is expedient? These are the underlying fundamental questions and issues, the political class and elites across the country are not bringing to the fore in their present ‘agitation’ for restructuring beyond their phraseologies and sloganeering.
 
The story of Brexit and the consequence of superficial introspection and circumspection in process which is still fresh in global history is manifest in yet-to-be resolved dilemma-like situation that subsist between the United Kingdom and European Union where the UK have had to revisit the referendum that led to its exit from EU. We as people should take a cue from that and look before we leap beyond the apparent political bargain weaponry being wielded at presently by sections of the ruling class and elites across the country as the 2019 elections approaches.
 
Nigerian politicians are largely inconsistent in their views obviously because the positions they assume at most times on national issues are directly proportional to their narrow political interests’ tendencies beyond that of the country. Majority of politicians’ views on restructuring therefore cannot be far-fetched from inconsistent.
 
Hence the recent calls being shielded in nationalism and genuine will for nation building from members of the ruling class should be handled with ‘a pinch of salt’. This is because the ruling class factions and fractions who lost out or are losing out in the jostle for control of and access to state power at central and sub national levels proceed to mobilize existing grievances along the lines of existing cleavages, as well as co-opt existing and incipient resistance struggles of impoverished and oppressed citizens against declining living conditions and intensifying economic hardships.
 
Finally, we think President Muhammad Buhari’s speech on the occasion of the 57th anniversary is one that inspires hope for a better Nigeria in spite of the background of being a country facing very serious challenges almost on all plains. So we commend him for demonstrating commitment and sincerity of purpose in rebuilding the nation and particularly in the bold confrontation against corruption since he took over the reins of power.
 
The President’s call on the National Assembly and the Judiciary for support is nothing but presidential in act and humility exemplified and we support every move that will ensure harmony amongst the arms of government. The President outlined some ways he intends to make the fight against corruption more effective and that is what is expected of a leader and Nigerians should support him on the campaign.
 
Quintessentially, Nigerians must resolve on altering the socio-economic and political system which has concentrated the wealth of the collective in the hands of a tiny few that have subsisted for too long in their country. This is the fundamental task that must be done. Long live, Nigeria!

Is designation of IPOB a terrorist group right?

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First and foremost, it is only the security agencies that can determine the veracity of that claim, whether the IPOB are a terrorist organisation or not. This is because there are conditions to be fulfilled by any organisation to be tagged a terror group.

However, what we could see is that the organisation, especially the leader, Nnamdi Kanu, made a number of statements that pointed towards insurgency, not terror. When someone is seen on social media (whether in a fake or an authentic video) openly soliciting arms and ammunition to fight the battle for self-determination in the country, that is a step beyond the red line.

Yes, people have a right to associate, to hold an opinion and propagate that opinion within the ambits of existing laws. The United Nations also said people have a right to self determination; but a situation where you want to wage war against your own country has a different connotation. That is the area we are looking at. The IPOB has set up some outfits which are confrontational to the existing government. It is like belittling the capacity of the existing government and no government will accept that.

If the movement does not use arms against security agencies, fine. If you ask the Department of State Services and the National Intelligence Agency, they are the ones to determine what the status of IPOB is. Government must also take the path of dialogue, which the IPOB should initiate by stating their grievances in writing to the Federal Government.

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CACOL CONDEMNS ATTACK ON SYMPATHIZERS OF SAHARA REPORTERS AT ILORIN HIGH COURT

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The Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership, CACOL has condemned the violence unleashed by suspected thugs and hirelings of Senator Bukola Saraki on sympathizers of Sahara Reporters at hearing of the case between the media organization and the corruption-tainted Senate President in Ilorin, Kwara State today.

An Ilorin High Court judge, Justice Adeyinka Oyinloye had in June this year slammed a N4 billion judgment against the Publisher of the popular online newspaper, Omoyele Sowore, over some stories published last year by the medium against Saraki. In what Sahara Reporters describes as ‘Jankara’ (backdoor) arrangement, Saraki through his lawyer, asked and got for the intervention of the court following the publication of series of libellous stories against him. Both Sowore and Sahara Reporters were joined as defendants in the suit marked as KWS/23/2017.
 
Mr. Debo Adeniran, Executive Chairman of CACOL, while condemning the violence stated that the development is totally unacceptable. “We are calling on the Inspector General of Police, IGP to immediately commission a probe into the circumstances that led to the situation of such brazenly murderous acts right in the full glare of Police officers.  And this is with the view of fishing out the perpetrators of the dastardly acts against innocent citizens that had every fundamental right to be at the court proceeding. Their sponsors too must also be exposed to end the reign of violence with impunity at that level.”
 
He said, “At the first hearing of Sowore’s appeal, journalists had their cameras, phones and other gadgets smashed and snatched; sympathizers were harassed and beaten up. Today again as the resumption of hearing Bukola Saraki’s thugs pounced on people right in front a contingent of the Nigerian police. The Police went ahead to arrest Sanyaolu Juwon, a popular Student Activist, Olowopariju Abiola, and Ohakpougwu Chinwendu in spite of being the victims of the premeditated attack.”
 
“When 106 Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SAN) in one his several shameful plethora of corruption trials escorted Saraki to court, nobody attacked them or any of his ‘sympathizers’ and collaborators. If resort to violence was the alternative why then did Senate President approach the court? Clearly, it is only the guilty that are always afraid and quick to opt for violence. Let the rule of law prevail over brigandage, the undue violence and harassment of Sahara Reporters must be halted now!
 

 

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